The present invention relates to a method for the removal of plaque from teeth and gums and a tooth brush for carrying out the method.
The methods and tooth brushes of the type under discussion have been known. Such a tooth brush has been disclosed, for example in DE-PS No. 87 605 of 1895. Openings have been provided in the bristle receiving surface of the tooth brush between the bristles, which openings have been in communication with a passage formed in the hand grip of the brush and, through a coupling connected to the end of that grip, with a flexible hose. The opposite end of the hose has been connected with a liquid-containing rubber vessel from which liquid could be pressed by hand pressure through the hose and the openings between the bristles and applied to the teeth surfaces.
A further method as well, as a tooth brush for carrying out the same, has been described in DE-GM 1, 966, 222. This method as well as the device therefore are distinguished from the above-described method and tooth brush in that the end of the hose connected to the tooth brush can be connected by a short tube with the interior of a spray bottle which is connectable by a further hose and a longer immersion tube with a device for generating pressurized air, which device is actuated by and connectable to the network by means of an electric wire.
Further conventional methods and tooth brushes have been known, which have been provided with customary water valves and were actuated by water pressure. Such tooth brushes have been disclosed in DE-PS 687, 746; DE-OS 2, 230, 177; DE-OS 27 21 699 and DE-OS 31 38 938.
In all above-mentioned conventional methods, the opening provided in the bristle-receiving surface of the tooth brush do not extend beyond that surface whereby a satisfactory spraying effect through the bristles is prevented or limited to a minimum so that an undesired mechanical irritation is exerted due to high pressure at inflammable spots in the oral cavity. Furthermore all those methods have in common that the tooth brushes are supplied during operation with liquid, preferably with water which, on the one hand, exerts a relatively high pressure, and, on the other hand, causes generation of new plaque on the teeth and gums. And finally, the liquid very often does not reach or insufficiently contacts a target spot because the distance between the outlet opening for the liquid and the target spot, for example a tooth stem, must be overlapped by the length of the bristles.